StART Up Program

It's a school without a campus, it's not yet recognized by the NCAA and it doesn't host any home meets, but the Academy of Art University cross country program won the Pacific West Conference championship last year and has even more aggressive goals.

The men's and women's cross country teams were two of 14 sports programs started two years ago after the school's president, Elisa Stephens, endeavored to create a more well-rounded student experience with the addition of an intercollegiate athletics division. She hired former San Francisco 49ers player Dr. Jamie Williams as athletic director and in the fall of 2008, the Urban Knights sports teams were born.

The cross country program, headed by then-coach Mike Spino, got started with a few promising freshmen from Bay Area high schools, a handful of students from Kenya and just about any other student who was willing to join the team. (Spino had been working on his dissertation in Kenya and recruited several runners through his connections there.) Without membership in an athletics conference (and thus no rival schools to run dual meets against), the Urban Knights had to beg their way into whatever invitationals would take them.

"It was kind of a hodgepodge situation that first year," says women's assistant head coach Anne Ricketts, a full-time English as a Second Language instructor who volunteered to coach the women's program two years ago. "We just kind of did whatever we could to get started."

Last year, their first competing in the Pacific West Conference, the men's team won the championship meet by placing five runners in the top seven, including a one-two finish from Amos Maru and Daveson Marindich. The women's program struggled with injuries and, at times, running with a full-scoring team of five runners, but still managed fourth in the conference meet.

But things are looking up for both programs this fall. The men's team returns intact, while the women's program has No. 1 runner Irinel Zamfir back after an eighth-place finish in the conference meet and being named the PacWest Newcomer of the Year last fall, along with junior Stacey Toth (22nd in conference), senior Monica Anguiano (24th plus several new recruits and walkons). And new head coach Charles Ryan was hired in August.

The school started the process of requesting NCAA Division II membership last year and, if all goes as hoped, it could receive provisional status next year, which means the Urban Knights cross country programs could be competing in an NCAA regional championship meet next November. The school would then be eligible to compete in the NCAA Division II championships, if it qualifies, in 2012.

Founded in 1929, the Academy of Art University is one of the top applied arts schools in the country and the only art university with a cross country team. Every student-athlete on the cross country teams is studying some field of art: graphic design, architecture, interior design, animation and mass media and communications. So is there a correlation between running and art?

"You can't really say we're all the same kind of people, but if there is a common thread it's that we're all creative and dedicated to what we're passionate about," says junior team captain Shawn Daut, who was recruited by Spino after running a 4:18 mile in high school. "We've got a lot of talent and we've got a lot of heart."

Adds Ricketts, 30, a former distance runner at UC-Davis: "It makes it tough to recruit, but there are a lot of kids who want to run and study art. A lot of them just don't think it's a possibility. They think they have to choose one or the other."

The school occupies several historic buildings in downtown San Francisco but doesn't have a main campus, athletic facilities or locker rooms. But it does have buses to take the runners to various workout locations. The teams used to train at the Presidio, but now they typically meet five or six days a week at Golden Gate Park for workouts. On weekends, they often do long runs in the Marin Headlands north of the Golden Gate Bridge.

Daut acknowledges that the program has been a work in progress. It isn't easy starting from scratch, nor is it easy having three coaches in three years. (Victor Hudson, a former college and semi-pro basketball player who owns a personal training business in San Francisco, was the head track and cross country coach last year.) But, he says, so far, so good. And it doesn't hurt that this year's conference meet is slated for Nov. 6 on Oahu (men's results; women's results).

"We didn't really have someone saying, 'OK, this is how we do things here.' But at the same time, it's been fun to be able to make things happen on our own," he says. "Now we just want to get to the NCAA regionals to see how we can compete."

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